lunes, 8 de julio de 2013

fishing buttons

Three weeks ago I flew to Innsbruck for some days. I interrupted my educational leave to train people from DHL and SOS on a method for collecting oral data. The workshop went well and I used the occasion to meet my friends, eat cheese and enjoying Grüner Veltliner (a wonderfully refreshing Austrian white wine).

After all this eating, meeting friends and work colleagues and getting slightly drunk on Gru Vee (I always wanted to write “Gru Vee”, that is the way New Yorkers call the Grüner Veltliner), I travelled back…but as usual, I experienced some situations during my trip.

It all started in with the transatlantic flight: Out of 44 rows in the plane, I got the worst one ever. Towards the end of the plane (it was an Airbus 340), each row no longer has the following number of seats 2 – aisle - 4 – aisle – 2, but it has one seat less: 2 - 3 – 2. My rwo was the worst because my seat was not right behind another seat, but between two seats. This means that the entertainment system (the small tv) was not in front of me but to my left…so, after watching the first half of “The Hobbit” my neck was already aching as hell.
Imagine how my neck felt after three movies
Then the food…yes, it is very often about the food. I completely forgot to tell the Lufthansa guys that I wanted a Vegan, Halal or Gluten-free meal. So, when they offered me “Beef or Pasta” I said pasta without hesitating - not because I don´t meat, but because I have serious doubts on the quality of airplane meat, even if it is from Sky Chefs, the guys who prepare Lufthansa´s meals. Long story short: I got for the first time in airplane history “pasta with beef-sauce”.
Menu 1: Beef, menu 2: Pasta with beef! Great idea Monsiuer Sky...
When I take long-haul flights, I always ask for an aisle-seat, so I can stretch my legs nicely: one to the aisle, the other one below the seat in front of me. This time, there was a metal box below the seat in front of me. I don´t know what it was, but it was as big as a Sony Playstation. When I got off the plane, I carefully watched all the seats I could to see who else in the plane could not stretch his/her legs because of this metal box: Nobody. I was the only one out of 300 passengers who had to stand up every 30 minutes to do pilates in front of the restrooms! And dear reader, believe me, people stare at you like if you are from other space when you do pilates in front of the plane´s toilette.
My weird seat and the f*cking metal box below the front seat
The cherry on top of the pie appeared just after landing…I will not narrate the happenings in that airport toilette, please judge only by what you see…trust your eyes. Let me tell you only two things: I really loved the trousers I was wearing; they have a special cut and I bought them last year in Buenos Aires, second thing: Before the button was on my fingers, it was somewhere else…a place you can see perfectly in the photograph.

Enjoy the picture…I can´t…I simply can´t…
Don´t you ever ask me about this buttos...ever!